Explore "The Lamplighter" by Thomas Burke on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The dark days now begin, when in afternoon / The Great Night Lantern makes a razor-edge / Of black and white in the streets. / And one comes, called the Lamplighter, / And the straight stiff lamps of these stiff London streets, / At his quick touch burst into light.
At this shy hour / I see from my unshaded window / Bright girls, hair flowing, go by with shuttered faces, / Holding close captive their warm insurgent bosoms. / And then, at the corner, / Some slender lad of bold and upright carriage / Greets them, and the shuttered lanterns of their faces / Burst with light at the touch of the lamplighter.
Oh, kind ingenious lamplighter, / Will you please step this way?